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Rio snares former Transurban chief as CFO

Paddy Manning and Matt O'Sullivan

Former Transurban chief executive Chris Lynch has been named Rio Tinto’s chief financial officer, to take over from long-serving Guy Elliott.

Mr Lynch, a non-executive director of Rio since September 2011, will remain on the board and join Rio’s executive committee.

He was CEO at Transurban from 2008 until 2012 and before that worked as CFO at BHP Billiton for six years and in senior roles at Alcoa for 20 years.

Rio announced in July that Mr Elliott, a 30-year veteran of the company, would retire from the board at the end of 2012.

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Rio chief executive Sam Walsh, who took over suddenly from Tom Albanese in January after the unveiling of $US14 billion in writedowns, said Mr Lynch was ‘‘an extremely high-calibre addition to our executive team with a strong pedigree of board, mining and financial experience. We are fortunate to have appointed someone so well qualified to take over from Guy, and I am grateful to Guy for remaining on the boards until the end of the year.”

Mr Lynch was credited with reducing Transurban’s high debt in the years following the global financial crisis and ditching the so-called Maquarie model, which included paying distributions out of borrowings.

He spent more than four years in the top job before leaving Transurban in July 2012 after deciding the ‘‘time was right’’ to pursue the ‘‘next stage’’ of his career.

But his time at Transurban was marked by repeated shareholder revolts over his high level of pay.

Mr Lynch will be awarded a base salary of $1.2 million per year with the opportunity to earn 120 per cent of his base salary as a short-term bonus.

“This is a wonderful opportunity for me to join Sam’s leadership team and work with him in refocusing the business on pursuing greater shareholder value," Mr Lynch said today. "I am really looking forward to getting stuck into the challenge and ensuring we deliver on our promises to improve this great business.”